The New York State Fashion Workers Act: What Model Management and Fashion Industry Companies Need to Know

Quick Hits

• New York State has enacted a law to protect fashion models from unfair contracts and payment practices.
• The law regulates activities of model management companies, their clients, and hiring parties and imposes various requirements to protect models in the fashion industry.
• The law establishes additional protections for employees, as well as supplements the protections that were established for all freelance workers by virtue of the passage of the New York State Freelance Isn’t Free Act.

New Requirements for Model Management Companies

Under the law, model management companies must:

• subject to narrow exemptions, register with the state, receive a certificate of registration, and provide the state with a surety bond of $50,000;
• act in good faith and in the model’s best interest in contract negotiations and financial management;

• use their best efforts to procure jobs for models;
• provide models with final agreements that the management company negotiated with clients at least twenty-four hours prior to the start of a model’s services;
• specify all items that may be initially paid for by the management company but will be deducted from the model’s compensation;
• disclose any financial relationships that may exist between the management company and clients;
• notify former models if the model management company collects royalties owed to a model the model management company no longer represents; and
• obtain written consent for the creation or use of a model’s digital replica.

In addition to the existing requirements established by the Freelance Isn’t Free Act requiring written contracts and timely payment of contracted compensation, the law imposes additional restrictions on contract terms and fees. Specifically, model management companies cannot:

• require or collect a fee or deposit from models when they enter into an agreement with the model management company;
• impose a contract term of more than three years;
• renew the model’s contract without written consent;
• impose commission fees greater than 20 percent of a model’s compensation;
• impose fees aside from those specified in advance;
• procure accommodations for which payment shall be provided or reimbursed by the model without prior disclosure; or
• advance the costs of travel or visa-related costs without consent.

New Requirements for Clients of Model Management Companies and Hiring Parties

Furthermore, the law requires clients of model management companies and hiring parties to:

• compensate models at time-and-a-half the contracted hourly rate for opportunities exceeding eight hours in any twenty-four–hour period;

• provide at least one thirty-minute meal break for any opportunity exceeding eight hours in any twenty-four–hour period;
• provide adequate levels of liability insurance to cover the health and safety of models; and
• obtain written consent for the creation or use of a model’s digital replica.

Protections From Abuse and Harassment; Retaliation Prohibited

The law also underscores the existing prohibition against discrimination, harassment, and retaliation, protecting employees and freelance workers in all industries, and it establishes some additional protections. Specifically, model management companies cannot retaliate against models who file a complaint under the law or decline/discontinue participation in a job due to reasonable, good-faith concerns about a violation of this law, or harass or discriminate against a model because of any legally protected status.

In addition, model management companies, their clients, and hiring parties must ensure that any employment or engagement does not pose an unreasonable risk of danger to the model, which includes, but is not limited to, ensuring that the employment or engagement has a “zero tolerance policy for abuse, harassment, or any other form of inappropriate behavior.”

Moreover, model management companies, their clients, and hiring parties must ensure that “any employment, engagement, entertainment, exhibition or performance which requires nudity or other sexually explicit material shall comply with the requirements of subdivision three of section fifty-two-c of the civil rights law,” which governs the unlawful dissemination or publication of a sexually explicit depiction of an individual.

Penalties, Complaint Process, and Private Right of Action

Model management companies that fail to comply with the law’s registration requirements may be subject to up to $3,000 in penalties for an initial violation and up to $5,000 in penalties for second or subsequent violations.

In addition, for violations of the law, models may file complaints with the New York State Department of Labor. Moreover, models can pursue a private right of action in court for certain violations of the law as well as for actual damages and recoup reasonable attorneys’ fees and costs, and liquidated damages.

Next Steps

With the effective date approaching, as well as the semiannual New York Fashion Week taking place in September 2025, model management companies, their clients, and hiring parties may wish to assess their policies and practices related to pay practices, workplace safety, anti-harassment, and use of digital replicas of models in order to become compliant with the law before the deadline. They may wish to review their existing contracts with models to ensure that they meet the requirements of this law and include all other requirements of the New York State Department of Labor’s model Freelance Worker Agreement.

Ogletree Deakins will continue to monitor developments and will provide updates on the New York, Retail, and Wage and Hour blogs as new information becomes available.

Jamie Haar is of counsel in Ogletree Deakins’ New York office.

Simone R. D. Francis is a shareholder in Ogletree Deakins’ New York and St. Thomas offices.

This article was co-authored by Leah J. Shepherd, who is a writer in Ogletree Deakins’ Washington, D.C., office.

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